


Head and Heart

by di93



Series: Inquisitorial Enigma [19]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Boys trying to protect eachother, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-23
Updated: 2017-04-23
Packaged: 2018-10-23 01:49:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10709616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/di93/pseuds/di93
Summary: A mission in the Emerald Graves goes sour, as they do when giants, ogres and behemoths all get involved. Kaaras gets hurt trying to protect Dorian, Kaaras avoids conversations again, and they all need some time to rest.





	Head and Heart

Missions with the Herald had about a 50/50 chance of going to plan, they had come to realize. Sometimes the most foolhardy missions would go astoundingly well, such as challenging the leader of the Blades of Hessarian to single-combat, and sometimes they would almost get slaughtered by despair demons while trying to herd a druffalo back to a farm. 

So when the Inquisitor decided that they would trek out to the Emerald Graves soon after the ball at the Winter Palace in order to hunt down Samson’s red luring smugglers in the hopes of getting an edge over their enemy as they waited to figure out what their next move would be, no one was quite sure what to expect. 

As it turned out, however, this particular excursion was entirely predictable in that a foolhardy missions would logically go terribly. 

At first, it seemed simple enough. Meet with Fairbanks, kill some smugglers, and get one step closer to defeating Corypheus. Then they received reports of giants.  

That information put the party on a little higher alert, but they’d handled giants before and certainly wouldn’t be any more difficult than the dragons they had managed to slay so far. 

Instead, they were met with not only a horde of giants while fighting smugglers that were accompanied by a red lyrium behemoth, but also a herd of brontos that were all too happy to wander close to the fight and then turn rabid the moment they inevitably got caught in the crossfire. 

Dorian had heard the phrase “shitstorm” once while on a boat on the waking sea during his voyage south, and while he had thought it a ridiculous term, it seemed to be the only way to accurately describe the situation in which they found themselves. 

Of course they didn’t even have a full stock of supplies on them before they wandered into that particular shitstorm either. Oh, no. They just finished taking care of three other rifts and had decided to press on without resupplying since it was barely afternoon when they had finished with the rifts by the river. 

So by the time they had downed their third giant and fourth bronto, along with the Templar bastards and a blighted red lyrium behemoth, they were out of healing potions and running low on stamina.  

Once Kaaras saw Dorian use a third lyrium potion, he knew he had to call it. It meant that they might not be able to recover the smugglers’ letters from their camp across the field, but Cullen would have to make do without. 

“Fall back to the Gracevine Camp!” he called out before throwing a fire wall up to cover Blackwall’s retreat. He watched from the corner of his eye as Dorian cast one last horror to send the bronto nearest to him fleeing. 

However, the giants were apparently either too thick-headed to feel afraid or were too thick-skinned to have anything to have anything to fear. Either way, the giant they were escaping picked up another boulder. 

Kaaras felt like the world was moving in slow motion as he watched the giant’s gaze fixate on the retreating mage. He ran. He pushed himself faster than he had even to escape the Fade, but even so, he knew he wouldn’t make it. It was like a nightmare, like something he couldn’t see was pulling him back by the ankles, keeping Dorian just out of reach.  

He knew he wouldn’t reach Dorian in time, and his piss-poor excuse of a barrier would do as much good as a panel of glass in the face of a boulder. And they were out of time. 

With a desperate leap, Kaaras tried to get as close as he could to the mage before putting his fingertips to his temple. It was a stupid act of desperation, but he prayed that using a mind blast would be enough to push the Tevinter farther away, just behind an outcropping of rock.  

When Dorian felt the smash of Kaaras’s mind blast, he dizzily wondered to himself if his horror spell had backfired and instead made a bronto rush after him. But then he felt more than heard a boulder shattering against the ground mere feet from him and he flinched as the debris rained down on him. 

Carefully, he sat up trying to regain his wits but saw Kaaras laying face-down just a few paces away. The Qunari’s staff was broken, the blade buried deep in its owner’s leg with a growing red stain around it. But perhaps even more frightening was the man’s horns. One metal piece gone and revealing a worn, broken stub, and the other metal horn was twisted and flattened beyond recognition.  

“K-Kaaras?” Dorian stammered, unable to believe his eyes, but the Qunari didn’t budge. 

Panicking, Dorian looked up to see the retreating back of the giant, heading towards yet another boulder, likely planning to make the rest of Kaaras resemble his horns.  

“Kaaras!” Dorian shouted, running to the man, grabbing his arm and pulling desperately. He was terrified of moving him, afraid of what sort of neck and head injuries he may have given the state of his horns, but he knew that he would be as good as dead if left out in the open. 

“Kaaras, please get up!” Dorian begged, paying no mind to his voice cracking. He couldn’t move the man on his own. This was the first time he’d ever considered being so large and muscular to be a detriment. “By the Maker—” Dorian looked up to see the giant lifting yet another boulder overhead. Quickly, Dorian cast a barrier over them both and then pulled deep from the Fade and forced an ice wall to rise up next to them to help protect them from the impact. 

As the ice materialized, the world spun around Dorian and he nearly toppled over. His mana was dangerously low and if he tried to cast something like that again, that spell could very well be his last, but he fought desperately to stay conscious. He had to get them out of there. 

With an ear-splitting crash, the ice wall busted apart, but so did the boulder. Raising his hand to shield his face from the debris, Dorian saw the giant stomp off in search of another rock, and with a deep breath, he pulled on the fade again, forming a thin sheet of ice beneath Kaaras, ignoring the black that seeped into the edges of his vision. Then he grabbed the man’s arm again, and with another desperate pull, he was able to make the man slide a pace closer to cover. 

Dorian kept at it, forming ice with his bare reserves of mana and pulling with what little strength he had left. Finally, just as another boulder crashed down next to their blessed cover, Dorian was able to pull Kaaras to relative safety. Somehow. He was sweating and couldn’t feel his legs and his vision was swimming and feared that he may vomit the remains of the elfroot potion he’d taken after the first bronto attempted to stomp him to death, but finally Dorian collapsed to his knees and took a breath.  

He could still hear the stomping of the giant, but it seemed a ways away and Dorian was one more spell away from collapsing in a heap as well, likely permanently.  

Even so, Dorian tried to regain his balance and force himself to stand. He had to get back to the camp. He had to get potions. He had to save Kaaras.  

Thankfully, before he managed to stumble more than two steps, a couple of heavy-breathing and panicked-looking inquisition scouts were sprinting towards them, and for perhaps the second time, Dorian was nearly overwhelmed by a sense of relief from the sight of that uniform. 

“Ser Pavus, are you—” 

“Don’t bother with me! Just help the Inquisitor!” Dorian ordered with as much authority as he could muster. The scouts nodded, but one still grabbed an elfroot potion from her bag and forced it into his hands. “You should be giving this to him, not—” 

“We need your help to move him. Drink it.” 

Dorian frowned but did as told while trying to keep himself calm. They weren’t out of trouble yet. Too much noise and the giant could come back, or another Bronto could find its way behind the outcropping of rock, or the Templars or smugglers could come investigating all of the ruckus. 

Luckily, they managed to make it back to camp and get Kaaras onto a cot without any of them sustaining any more damage, which was good, because the moment Kaaras was settled, Dorian’s trembling legs finally gave out from under him. He only caught a glimpse of his lover’s chest weakly rise and fall before he lost consciousness, not hearing the panic that filled the camp as he collapsed into a heap. 

 

oOo 

 

When Dorian woke, his mouth had the gritty, bitter taste of elfroot, his head pounded with a migraine, and he immediately wanted to go back to sleep. In fact, he gladly felt himself giving into the inviting pull of the fade until he heard someone quietly humming nearby. 

Reluctantly, he cracked open one eye, slightly relieved when the tent was dim so it didn’t exasperate his pounding headache. Then his eye settled on a hulking form sitting just a pace away, wrapping up his calf in a bandage, humming to himself as he did. 

Dorian sat up – far too quickly – and managed to get words out over his own groan. “You’re alright?” he managed before catching his head in his hands, trying not to vomit as the world spun and swayed around him. Maker, this was worse than his worst hangover. 

“Dorian?” he heard Kaaras breathe, as if he couldn’t quite believe it, and between the cracks in his fingers, Dorian saw Kaaras abandon his bandage, ignoring as the cloth strip dangled uselessly from his leg and crawled closer. Then he felt the man guiding him back down onto the cot and Dorian didn’t have the energy to resist. “You’re okay. You’re okay,” Kaaras mumbled, more to himself than to Dorian, and Dorian grabbed the large hand pressing his chest back towards the bed, giving it a weak squeeze, not sure if it was his hand that was shaking or Kaaras’s. 

“So are you.” 

Kaaras gave him a soft smile that Dorian could only just make out in the dim light before those lips were pressed to his forehead. “Go back to sleep, Dorian. I’ll still be here,” he promised, and while Dorian didn’t want to give into the pull of the fade this time, he was helpless to fight it. 

“You’d better,” he tried to threaten before he closed his eyes, distantly hearing a huff of laughter as he slipped into the fade. 

 

oOo 

 

“So, the horns were empty all along?” Varric asked as they headed back to Skyhold, letters from Samson safely packed away to deliver to Cullen. Kaaras’s shoulders stiffened though his eyes remained firmly on the horizon, only giving a silent nod in response. 

Dorian glanced over, worrying. Kaaras had already explained it to him while they were in Sahrnia, but as far as he knew, only himself, Kaaras, and Leliana knew the truth of Kaaras’s past. 

“How’d you lose them? Too narrow a door? Spell gone wrong? Got tired of ripping all your shirts on them?” Varric asked. 

“Did an enemy get it?” Blackwall proposed. Kaaras remained silent, but Varric scoffed. 

“Hero, you’ve got no imagination. This is the Inquisitor we’re talking about. Something that boring wouldn’t fit with the narrative,” he explained before turning back to Kaaras. “A dragon bit it off out of jealousy?” 

Dorian saw that Kaaras was still stiff, but that suggestion, at least, made a ghost of a smile appear on Kaaras’s lips. 

“Compensation?” Blackwall suggested, making Varric laugh aloud, but this time Dorian made a sound that was very close to a snort. 

“Hardly,” Dorian laughed, which only made Varric laugh more as Blackwall coughed uncomfortably. This time, Kaaras’s neck burned red, though the smile on his face solidified a little more. 

Once Varric’s laughter calmed down and they threw out a few more suggestions that Kaaras seemingly ignored, Varric paused, wondering for a moment. 

“Y’know, I met a few Qunari and Tal Vashoth mages in Kirkwall,” he started, and Kaaras’s shoulders went rigid again. 

“I believe you mean that Bianca met them,” Dorian corrected, trying to steer the conversation away, if he could. 

“She wanted to say hello. Who am I to deny her?” Varric said with a shrug before turning back to the Inquisitor. “But none of them had horns either. Is that a mage thing? Magic a fireball from thin air, lose a bit of a horn?” he proposed, but when Kaaras stayed silent, all remnants of his smile gone, Varric shook his head. “No, you’re right. Don’t tell me. It would ruin the mystery. Have to stay true to character.” 

 

oOo 

 

The moment they arrived back at Skyhold, Kaaras headed straight to Leliana’s tower, knowing she would be there despite it being well-past dark, barely sending Dorian a smile before departing. The mage tried not to be offended. Of course he would report to his advisors first. He was the Inquisitor, after all. No need to be jealous of paperwork. 

With a weary sigh, Dorian went back to his quarters, very much looking forward to washing up and getting out of the blood-stained robes. He undressed, tossing his clothes in a corner to deal with cleaning and patching later, and set about readying a bath in the woefully small tub that somehow managed to fit in his quarters. He was exhausted, but not even the Maker himself could keep him from taking a proper bath, and with the aid of a few ice spells followed by a bit of fire, his room was quickly filled with steam. 

With a blissful sigh, Dorian sank into the water and groaned with delight as he washed off the grime and massaged on his usual fragrant oils. Of course, it wasn’t quite what he was used to from back home, but this was his and it was more than he’d had in weeks. 

It was while he was washing his hair that a knock at his door surprised him. 

“Dorian?” he heard that familiar voice call quietly, and he couldn’t help feeling a little pleased that he won out over paperwork, if not his advisors. “Are you awake?” 

Well, he wasn’t quite in the coiffed and poised state that he preferred to be in when entertaining guests, but… 

“I’m awake,” Dorian replied, purposefully letting his legs slide to rest on the edge of the tub and letting his head fall back as he continued combing his hands through his hair. He may not have wax in his hair anymore or kohl lining his eyes, but it wasn’t like he needed that to make an impression. Especially with the aid of a steaming bath. 

“May I come in?” Kaaras asked, because of course he would ask permission to enter a room in his own bloody fortress. 

“You may,” Dorian called with a roll of his eyes, and listened as the door creaked open until it very suddenly stopped, and he heard Kaaras nearly choke on a breath. “Don’t just stand there with the door open. You’re letting out the heat” he said, keeping his voice casual as a grin threatened to split his lips. Silence dragged out for a few moments before he heard door close. Kaaras cleared his throat anxiously, and Dorian finally opened his eyes to look at the man who was almost glowing from his blush as he stood by the door. 

“Did you need something?” Dorian asked, finally letting a little smirk play across his lips, and Kaaras’s eyes seemed to get darker even as his blush seemed to grow even brighter. 

“I just thought—um—” Kaaras stammered, losing his train of thought as Dorian slid his leg along the lip of the bathtub. 

“Yes?” 

Kaaras made a sound that was something between a grown and a whine, sending a delightful shiver down Dorian’s spine as the Tal-Vashoth looked away. “You’re going to make me want to join you, you know,” he managed this time, still keeping his eyes averted from the overpowering image of the mage lounging in the bath tub. 

“Oh, by all means,” Dorian replied with a salacious grin that would have made Kaaras turn even more red if it were possible. 

“The tub will break.” 

“Fair point. But as long as you’re here, make yourself useful and wash my hair for me, will you?” Dorian suggested, and Kaaras wasn’t sure he wasn’t going to melt. 

He walked over and knelt behind Dorian, scooping up a bit of water and washing it over the man’s hair, careful to make sure it didn’t drip down his forehead and into his eyes. He wasn’t sure he was still breathing. How could any person be so beautiful? And so powerful? And brilliant? Kind? 

“Kaaras?” Dorian prompted when the large hands running through his hair stopped. 

“I love you,” Kaaras managed in a choked whisper, sounding like he was completely overcome with emotion, and Dorian couldn’t help a soft smile, though he didn’t reply, not that Kaaras expected him to. Apparently getting ahold of himself, Dorian felt Kaaras’s hands moving again, diligently going about their work, and Maker, but it was a blissful thing to be doted on by a man who commanded armies. 

“You still haven’t said why you came, you know,” Dorian prompted after a while. 

“Oh,” Kaaras murmured, apparently having forgotten himself. “I just, I thought that—” Kaaras stammered before dropping his forehead to rest against the damp crown of Dorian’s head. “I was so scared when that giant was after you. And then when I woke up, you were passed out, and you looked like—I’m so glad you’re okay,” he whispered, nuzzling his face against Dorian’s damp locks, and the Tevinter was almost certain that a fireball had landed in his chest with how quickly his heart melted. 

“Next time you rescue me from a boulder, try not to pass out afterwards. In case you haven’t noticed, you’re quite large. Not easy to drag you cross-country,” Dorian scolded half-heartedly, but he felt Kaaras nod. 

“I won’t,” he promised with a surprising amount of determination. It made Dorian raise a brow. 

“Did you come up with an anti-boulder defense plan? Or are we to simply avoid giants for the rest of time? I suppose that would work, though I’m not certain how you plan to maneuver around the Emerald Graves.” 

“I’m going to talk to Commander Helaine in the morning,” Kaaras replied plainly, but Dorian’s chest hurt. He knew how much Kaaras hated seeing people get hurt, how much he hated not being able to do more, hated _himself_ for not being able to do more.  

Suddenly, an ominous feeling came over him. Maker, this man was going to run himself into the ground trying to protect them all. Memories of Haven and Adamant flooded Dorian’s mind, and he thought he might choke. He couldn’t let Kaaras do that again. Not now. Not again.  

“At least tell me you’re going to rest for a few days before heading out again,” Dorian almost pleaded, but Kaaras didn’t say anything as he returned to gently combing his fingers through the mage’s damp hair. “Maker, please, even you have to rest. I certainly have to before we leave again,” he reasoned. 

“You don’t have to—” 

Dorian sat up and turned to glare at Kaaras. 

“You are _not_ going without me, not after that. If you suggest such a thing, so help me, I—” 

“Okay, alright. I’ll rest. _We_ will rest,” Kaaras promised, trying to wave Dorian down before he started throwing spells. He glared for a moment longer just to get his point across before settling back into the water, and after a moment’s hesitation, Kaaras timidly returned to washing Dorian’s hair. 

“Going without me. Preposterous. Odds would go down to five to one, at least,” he grumbled, and Kaaras couldn’t help a small smile. 

“And with you?” 

“Three to one.” 

“I’ll take that bet,” Kaaras chuckled quietly, pressing his lips to Dorian’s temple, and Dorian felt his chest melting again as he relaxed back into Kaaras’s hands. 


End file.
